18 SAROA NEWS · over 3600m in 2014 and the Von Doussa this year. Nishiazabu is jointly owned by...
Transcript of 18 SAROA NEWS · over 3600m in 2014 and the Von Doussa this year. Nishiazabu is jointly owned by...
All the latest news from the South Australian
Racehorse Association
Richard Stafford - SAROA secretary reports
SAROA NEWS
We received three
nominations for
Owner of the Month
for March, one for
Gerald Schlink who had two winners
during the month with Highest Note
and Point Drummond (2 wins at Port
Lincoln) while his horse Rooboy ran
second in the city on two occasions;
Harry Perks for Royal Rumble winner
of the CS Hayes Memorial Cup (a listed
race) and Mark Hall for Nishiazabu
who managed two steeplechase wins
and a second during March. After
some deliberation between three
very worthy candidates,
our committee finally
opted for Nishiazabu.
Congratulations to Mark who wrote
the following about Nishi:
Nishiazabu is by the little known
stallion, Ice Point (Arg) who won 2
Group 1’s in Argentina from Hello
Doctor who was placed in a WA Oaks.
Trained by Heather and Kevin Frew,
the seven year old gelding has now
won six races from sixty one starts
for total prizemoney of $230,000.
Nishiazabu or “Nishi” as he is
affectionately known has won three
races in the first three months of 2016
including winning the Von Doussa
Steeplechase and a brave second in the
Great Eastern Steeplechase. He has an
extraordinary record at Oakbank having
won four races and three placings from
eight starts including his maiden win over
2150m in 2012, the Tattsbet Handicap
over 3600m in 2014 and the
Von Doussa this year.
Nishiazabu is jointly owned
by Mark and Jodie Hall of
Cherry Gardens, South Australia
and Dr Bob Jemison of Ballina,
New South Wales. Bob bred the
gelding after Mark expressed
his dream - to own his first
racehorse, specifically a stayer.
Bob actually bred and sold
Mark two horses for a total
of $20,000. The first was a
sprinter named Mawari that
unfortunately broke down
after winning her maiden.
The second horse was
Nishiazabu, which Mark named
after the Tokyo suburb where he and
Jodie lived in the early 2000’s.
Nishiazabu was a rather unattractive,
weak weanling and as a yearling he
attracted little attention or hope.
Despite Mark’s patience and willingness
to wait as long as it would take, he
showed nothing as a 2yo and very little
as a 3yo. Heather and Kevin Frew
persisted and Nishi finally won a weak
maiden at Oakbank in December 2012.
It wasn’t until April 2014, as a 5yo that
OWNER OF THE MONTH
� � � � � � �� � � � � � � �� � �� � � � � � �� � � � �� � � � � � �� � � � � � � �Nishiazabu winning the
Von Doussa Steeplechase
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SAROA NEWS18
Nishi showed he could stay when he
saluted in the marathon 3600m BM90
at the Oakbank carnival. Although
Nishiazabu could in fact “stay all day”,
he lacked the zip at the end of his races
to be a quality stayer on the flat. The
rest of 2014 was lean with Nishi
struggling in a number of hurdle races
and appearing to lose interest and form
to the point where on New Years Day
2015 he ran 12 length 8th in a 2200m
BM68 at Murray Bridge after which Mark
and Kevin Frew decided to retire him.
Mark took a call from Kevin later
that month that rekindled the dream.
Unbeknown to Mark, Kevin had doubts
about Nishi’s health and following a
series of tests a minor problem was
found and treated. Nishi returned to
work and was given a chance to prove
himself over the larger steeple jumps.
It quickly became obvious that not only
did he love it, he was very good at it!
Only 3 months after being “retired” he
went on to run 4th in the Von Doussa,
3rd in the Great Eastern and 5th in the
Grand Annual in his first jumping season.
As proposed by Kevin and his regular
jockey Paul Hamblin, Nishi returned
lengths better in 2016 with a his initial
jumping season behind him and in the
first 3 months of 2016 has won over
$130,000 in prizemoney, having won 3
races and run 3 placings from 8 starts.
Mark’s advice to anyone dreaming of
owning a good stayer is that patience
is the key as is engaging someone like
the Frew family who can patiently
condition and develop the right horse
to draw out its full potential.
I think Mark’s closing comment rings
true for most of us, it is often a tough call
on the future for our lesser performed
horses but clearly in Nishi’s case patience
and perseverance paid off in spades.
OUR WEBSITE & FACEBOOK PAGE
As one of the administrators of our
Website, I am stoked at both what we
have been able to incorporate into
the site and with the response that
there has been to it. We have been
favourably surprised with the number
of hits we have received and with the
response to our “Free Membership”
offer. We believe strongly that it is of
vital importance for SAROA to be in
contact with SA owners and act as an
accessible resource for them. If you
haven’t already done so be sure to
check out www.saroa.com.au.
For quite some time now SAROA
has had a regular spot as part of the
Punter’s Club hosted by Ray Fewings
on Radio 5 RPH (1197), each Saturday
morning. The show runs from 8 am
until 9 am and our segment takes
place around 8:20. Usually our
President Luke Koumi joins Ray to
discuss current issues in racing as
they affect owners. Our Owner of the
Month is usually interviewed by Ray
as well and this provides some quite
interesting radio for the listeners.
With the revamp of the website we
are now able to include audio from
each session on 5 RPH on the website
for those who might be interested
and we thank the station for allowing
us to provide this service.
To address the explosion of social
media in recent years, SAROA has also
established a Facebook page and
thanks to Keryn Corr, JoAnne Miller
and Jenny Simpson that page is
updated regularly with racing news,
SAROA events and our owner’s
winners. Please forgive us if we miss
one of your wins, as the current
process to match race results to
owners and then to our members is
rather convoluted and somewhat “hit
and miss”. By all means please let us
know if you have had a winner and we
have missed it, as we have access to
photos of race wins which we can
display on our the Facebook page
with thanks to Terry Hann of
Atkins Photography.
We have plans to investigate the
“Twittersphere” and maybe Instagram
in due course to further broaden our
accessibility to owners.
CORRESPONDENCE:
PO Box 1139, Gumeracha SA 5233
Richard Stafford (Secretary)
Mobile: 0432 664 824
Email: richard@
sanguineracing.com.au
Or for more information visit:
www.saroa.com.au
OWNER
OF THE MONTH
Owner of the month
nominations can be made by
email or letter or even by a
phone call to me; nominations
should be received by 10th
day of the following month.
Nominations can come from
the owner or a friend,
acquaintance or family
member but the nominee
must be a SAROA member.
We also prefer that the
application is combined with
a good story about the horse
involved, as this award is just
as applicable to lowly maiden
winners as it is to winners
of feature races.
Our committee review all
nominations then select the
monthly winner, who will
receive a $100 voucher, kindly
donated by SAROA members
Jenny and Wayne Francis to
be used at any of the Francis
group of hotels – namely the
Elephant and Castle, The Port
Noarlunga, the OG and the
German Arms hotels.
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